M+N Critics Poll 2012

You’ve had the chance to tell us your favourite local albums of the year in our seventh annual [Readers Poll](/news/4543630). Now, it’s our critics? turn to weigh in. Below we count down the top 50 Australian records of 2012, which saw a bunch of debuts, some welcome comebacks and the emergence of several “supergroups”.

50. Emma Russack

Sounds Of Our City
(Spunk Records)

Key notes: Self-produced debut album for the Melbourne-based, Narooma-born singer previously known as Lola Flash.

What we said: [?For all its universal themes, the record still starts and ends with city life. It’s the most therapeutic of ellipses.”](/releases/2000995)

49. New War

New War
(Sensory Projects/Polyester Records)

Key notes: The debut album for Melbourne four-piece New War.

What we said: [?Down to a note and down to a lyric, it feels as though anything other than what New War has delivered here was never an option.?](/releases/2001091)

48. Galapagoose

What we said: [?Commitments doesn’t always come together, sure, but you get the feeling Gill doesn’t necessarily want it to.”](/releases/2001026)

47. Francolin

Won’t Let You Down
(Independent)

Key notes: A warm and energetic debut album from this rising Melbourne band.

What we said: [?The songs come back and grab you again after you’ve only heard them a couple of times. What more could anyone want from pop?”](/releases/2001074)

46. No Zu

Life
(Sensory Projects)

Key notes: The debut album for art-rockers NO ZU is diverse and unique, much like the EP which preceded it.

What we said: [?At first Life is all a bit too much – what I imagine a Victorian College of the Arts party turns into at 2 am – but on further listen the sound collages and carnival nature of the music is actually a lot of fun.?](/releases/2001117)

45. Alpine

A is for Alpine
(Ivy League)

Key notes: Ethereal debut album from Melbourne six-piece Alpine, the follow-up to their [Zurich](/releases/2000803) EP.

What we said: [?Alpine are that rarest of young local bands, where you can say with confidence they’re already the complete package. A is for Alpine should see them find a wide audience both here and internationally. It certainly deserves to.”](/releases/2001104)

More reading: [Track By Track – A is for Alpine](/articles/4515913)

44. POND

Beard, Wives, Denim
(Modular)

Key notes: The fourth album for psychedelic rockers POND, who share three members with Tame Impala.

What we said: [?Beard, Wives, Denim is decidedly a low-stakes, zero-stress sampler of styles and approaches. It may find much of its richness in music of the past, but it’s more rewarding to just take it all in than to play name-the-influence.”](/releases/2001018)

43. No Anchor

The Golden Bridge
(Independent)

Key notes:The Golden Bridge is the fourth album for Brisbane ?sludge-rock? trio, self-described as “the most No Anchor of all the No Anchor records”.

35. Fabulous Diamonds

Key notes:Recorded at Melbourne’s John Curtin Hotel, Commercial Music* is the third album for the duo Nisa Venerosa and Jarrod Zlatic. It follows 2010?s *[II](/releases/2000660).

What we said: [“You can file Commercial Music under whichever age demographic you please, but Fabulous Diamonds still sound like no one else, which is definitely a feat for any kind of ?contemporary? music.”](/releases/2001095)

More reading: [Interview – Fabulous Diamonds](/articles/4510698)

34. Catcall

The Warmest Place
(Ivy League)

Key notes: Long-awaited debut album from Sydney’s Catherine Kelleher. Featuring ?The World Is Ours? which came in at #13 in our [Tracks of the Year](/articles/4540908) and ?Swimming Pool?, our [song of the year](/articles/4157920) for 2010.

What we said: [“This is heart-on-sleeve, ears-in-adolescence pop, where every tired pop trope has been fished from the dustbin and carefully reconstructed to remind you why you liked it so much when you were less cynical.”](/releases/2001046)

More reading: [Track By Track – The Warmest Place](/articles/4462757)

33. Something for Kate

Leave Your Soul to Science
(EMI)

Key notes:Leave Your Soul to Science is the sixth album for the Melbourne trio led by Paul Dempsey.

32. Hermitude

HyperParadise
(Elefant Traks)

Key notes: Fourth album by Blue Mountains hip-hop group Hermitude, featuring the triple j-endorsed singles ?Get In My Life? and ?Speak Of The Devil?.

31. Bored Nothing

Bored Nothing
(Spunk Records)

Key notes: The debut album of Melbourne DIY musician Fergus Miller, his first true release after a series of homemade tapes.

More reading: [Track By Track – Bored Nothing](/articles/4530710)

30. Collarbones

Die Young
(Two Bright Lakes)

Key notes: Sydney/Adelaide duo make R&B-inflected follow-up to 2011?s Iconography. Featuring ?Missing? and ?Hypothermia?, which tied for #10 in our [Tracks of the Year](/articles/4540908).

What we said: [?Collarbones seem like a genuine attempt to recreate the dramatics of pop music, as if the weirdness sneaking in through their choice of sounds and subjects is almost accidental’And we’re left holding this broken thing that sounds diffuse and eerie but has a poignant charm.?](/releases/2001121)

More reading: [Track by Track – Die Young](/articles/4521092)

29. Bushwalking

First Time
(Army of Bad Luck)

Key notes: First album for Melbourne/Sydney conglomerate, comprising members of Fabulous Diamonds, Songs and KES Band.

What we said: [?It’s meditative in a way that’s sometimes lovely and sometimes vaguely disturbing. ?We’re in our own world,? sings Stiles on the closing ?Warmth?, summing up band and album both.?](/releases/2001072)

More reading: [Interview – Bushwalking](/articles/4499384)

28. UV Race

Racism
(Aarght!)

Key notes: Warragul-via-Melbourne punks UV Race release their third album, following 2011?s [Homo](/releases/2000869). They continue to outlay fables and life lessons without defaulting on their core promises by dropping the dick jokes or toning down the gnarling asides.

27. Toot Toot Toots

26. Ocean Party

Social Clubs
(Sound of Melbourne/Birds Love Fighting)

Key notes: Second of two 2012 efforts from low-key Melbourne quintet. Follows [The Sun Rolled Off The Hills](/releases/2001029).

What we said: [?These guys mingle happiness and sadness in a way that should appeal to any Beach Boys or Kinks fan, while at the same time proving as tuned into common Australian life as Dick Diver or Lower Plenty.?](/releases/2001129)

25. Dirty Three

Toward The Low Sun
(Anchor & Hope/Remote Control)

Key notes: Drought-breaking eighth album for revered trio. Recorded by Casey Rice.

What we said: [?Toward The Low Sun is a work that successfully melds the strongest elements of their past with persuasive experimentation that’s done with subtlety, economy and reach. It contains some of the noisiest, most insistent music the Dirty Three have yet created, however it also takes time to unfold and reveal itself.?](/releases/2001002)

More reading: [Interview – Warren Ellis](/articles/4432047)

24. The Presets

Pacifica
(Modular/Universal)

Key notes: Third album for Sydney electronic duo, following on from 2008?s all-conquering Apocalypso. Features ?Ghosts?, which came in at #15 in our [Tracks of the Year](/articles/4540908)

What we said: [?It’s an intuitive grasp of the genres they’re working with that allows The Presets to so thrillingly distort them or take them to such extremes that they become something else, something transcendent.?](/releases/2001115)

More reading: [Interview – Kim Moyes](/articles/4525651)

23. Nikko

Gold & Red
(Tenzenmen)

Key notes: Second album for Brisbane band after 2010?s [The Warm Side](/releases/2000683).

What we said: [?Most of this album is an examination into dead relationships, and strangely for a songwriter, Potter is rarely the one being let down. Instead, a hidden violence hides behind his voice as he breaks the hearts of others.?](/releases/2001076)

More reading: [Track by Track – Gold & Red](/articles/4503624)

22. Woollen Kits

Woollen Kits
(R.I.P. Society/Fuse)

Key notes: Long-awaited debut from Melbourne lo-fi trio. Second release of the year in addition to [Four Girls](/news/4527394).

20. Liars

What we said: [?Where others play fancy dress; Liars shapeshift. And, while their landscapes aren’t of this world, their aesthetic is. ?Life is sad,? said Rowland S Howard. Yes, it is. It’s also terrifying, murderous and beautiful. All at once.?](/releases/2001066)

More reading: [Interview – Angus Andrew](/articles/4477811)

19. Joe McKee

Burning Boy
(Dot Dash/Remote Control)

Key notes: Debut solo album from former Snowman singer. Features ?Lunar Sea?, which came in at #7 in our [Tracks of the Year](/articles/4540908).

What we said: [?It’s a record about powerlessness, a particularly resonant theme in 2012. It’s about being too far away or too ineffectual to influence, but maybe against the odds someone will hear you.?](/releases/2001067)

More reading: [Track by Track – Burning Boy](/articles/4474487)

18. Graveyard Train

Hollow
(Spooky)

Key notes: The ball-and-chain wielding six-piece’s third album following 2010?s [The Drink The Devil and The Dance](/articles/4032535).

What we said: [?Their third album – sees them moving ever further away from their chaotic, noisy, performance-based beginnings into a band that have reined in the sound without losing any of the

16. Rat Columns

Sceptre Hole
(Smartguy)

Key notes: San Francisco-based musician (and sometime Total Control member) David West’s first album under the Rat Columns moniker.

What we said: [?This is a great record that showcases West’s ideas and talent – talent that enables him to deftly meld the experimental with his ability to write a compelling pop song.?](/releases/2001090)

15. Paul Kelly

Spring and Fall
(Universal)

Key notes: The long-awaited return from one of Australia’s most revered songwriters. A low-key concept album about the blooming and withering of a relationship.

What we said: [?Over 12 concise tracks, Kelly sings about fresh infatuation, deepening summer love, projected infidelity and the long painful break-ups that come when such connections are ground under the heel of time and disillusionment.?](/releases/2001137)

14. Urthboy

Smokey’s Haunt
(Elephant Traks)

Key notes: Fourth solo album from Blue Mountains rapper, label head and member of The Herd.

13. DZ Deathrays

Bloodstreams
(I Oh You/Illusive)

Key notes: Debut album for Brisbane two-piece, produced by PVT’s Richard Pyke.

What we said: [?The danger, of course, is that when you clean up the sonic mess, people pay a lot more attention to the songwriting. In that sense, DZ have – for the most part – lifted their game substantially, and there’s a clutch of delirious belters that stand up to repeated listens.?](/releases/2001034)

12. Spencer P Jones & The Nothing Butts

Spencer P Jones & The Nothing Butts
(Shock)

Key notes: The Aus rock ?supergroup? that just had to happen: former Beasts of Bourbon bandmates Spencer P Jones and James Baker team up with The Drones? Fiona Kitschin and Gareth Liddiard.

What we said: [?It may look and sound a bit rough and ready initially but, like all Jones? work, over time and repeated listens it will gain a rich veneer and you will be very glad to own it. Just don’t take it for granted.?](/releases/2001141)

11. Mental Powers

What we said: [?While Mental Powers? embrace of the synthesizer for this release could be interpreted as a band hopping on a global trend, knowing their penchant for evolving in tandem with each other and their instruments, it’s probably more likely the result of access and availability to said hardware.?](/releases/2001143)

The Top 10

10. Ned Collette + Wirewalker

2
(Dot Dash/Inertia)

Key notes: Ned Collette’s fourth album (and his second credited to Wirewalker). Recorded in Berlin with drummer/producer Joe Talia.

What we said: [?You don’t have to behold the mock European suaveness of the film clip for ?Long You Lie? to recognise the single’s saucy funk licks and blurred synth tones as having one foot on the dance floor. It’s got a sense of humour, as proven by those would-be ominous backing intonations, and there’s a silly sweetness to the whole thing that can make one coast over the fraught visions of Collette’s lyrics.?](/releases/2001049)

More reading: [?Storytellers – Ned Collette?](/articles/4480559)

9. Boomgates

Double Natural
(Bedroom Suck)

Key notes: Debut album from Melbourne garage-rock ?supergroup?, a five-piece featuring members of Dick Diver, Eddy Current Suppression Ring, Teen Archer and Twerps.

What we said: [?Boomgates may be a band in their own right, but they are a band that comes with a prologue, eliciting more the rush of d’j? vu than the mundanity of repetition, even when the songs are concerned with the latter.?](/releases/2001119)

8. Bamboos

Medicine Man
(Inertia)

Key notes: Fifth album for the Melbourne soul/funk collective. Featuring collaborations with Aloe Blacc, Megan Washington and Tim Rogers (the latter, ?I Got Burned?, came in at #5 in our [Tracks of the Year](/articles/4540908)).

What we said: [?This is a record of songs, rather than jams, with clear, dominant hooks and unhurried progressions’It?s lean, uncomplicated stuff, making Medicine Man a much nimbler and more accessible Bamboos record.?](/releases/2001061)

7. Sophie Hutchings

Night Sky
(Preservation)

Key notes: The second album for Sydney pianist Hutchings, following 2010?s [Becalmed](/releases/2000751). Produced by Tim Whitten.

What we said: [?This isn’t music to whack on while you clean the house or drive to the shops: this demands attention and rewards it handsomely. Night Sky is the soundtrack to a film too heartbreakingly beautiful to exist.?](/releases/2001118)

6. Pop Singles

All Gone
(Vacant Valley)

Key notes: First album for the Melbourne dreamy guitar-pop three-piece. Follows a [self-titled debut EP](/releases/2000520) (2009).

What we said: [?This is an album for fans of The Chills, The Smiths and The Go-Betweens, fans who sigh on listening and wish they were born 20 years earlier. Or, just as likely, sigh and wish they were 20 years younger.?](/releases/2001099)

5. Bitch Prefect

Big Time
(Bedroom Suck)

Key notes: Debut album for Melbourne ?chillmate? trio. Features ?Bad Decisions? which came in at #14 in our [Tracks of the Year](/articles/4540908).

What we said: [?Bitch Prefect romanticise failure, tap into the freedom of limited options and smile through all the complaints.?](/releases/2001089)

4. Oh Mercy

Deep Heat
(Capitol/EMI)

Key notes: Third album for Alexander Gow’s Melbourne-based band following last year’s [Great Barrier Grief](/releases/2000859). Recorded in Portland, Oregon, with Burke Reid, featuring Los Lobos? Steve Berlin on sax and flute.

What we said: [?The reason Oh Mercy get away with this sort of unpredictability without it coming across as pretentiousness or simply inconsistency is the fact that, whether autobiographical in theme or not, Gow’s performances hit an emotional core nobody else in pop is getting near.?](/releases/2001102)

More reading: [In the studio with Oh Mercy](/articles/4527034)

3. Grand Salvo

Slay Me In My Sleep
(Preservation/Inertia)

Key notes: Paddy Mann’s sixth album as Grand Salvo, following 2009?s [Soil Creatures](/releases/2000391). A surreal song cycle, based around the love between an old woman and a young boy.

What we said: [?In a world that insists on pace, Mann pauses to hold the small, quiet things to the light and spin them around, clarity and colour angling from their depth like opals.?](/releases/2001086)

2. Tame Impala

Lonerism
(Modular)

Key notes: Second album for the recording project of Perth’s Kevin Parker following 2009?s [Innerspeaker](/releases/2000651). Written, recorded and produced by Parker and mixed by Dave Fridmann.

What we said: [?Taken in context with everything else Parker and company are involved in, Lonerism is fascinating. On its own, though, it seems less like an exciting new direction than an admittedly charming creative cul-de-sac?](/releases/2001122)

More reading: [Interview – Kevin Parker](/articles/4524898)

1. Lower Plenty

Hard Rubbish
(Special Award)

Key notes: Second album for Melbourne-based band, comprising members of Total Control, The UV Race and Deaf Wish.

What we said: [?Lower Plenty’s Hard Rubbish is an incredible assembly of some extraordinarily normal characters. There are no pointed fingers or worldly issues addressed, just insular observations of personality flaws, lost relationships and confused emotions. It makes for a very human record that, as a result, becomes achingly familiar.?](/releases/2001036)